Total Baroque – Total Baroque Magazine

Pictures of the Week

Vienna, Montreal, São Paulo, Dresden, Lyon and Toronto

From Montreal to São Paulo, from Dresden to Vienna, the baroque world was in full flight this week: anniversaries, tours, new productions and fresh interpretations of major works. A visual round-up of the concerts and projects animating today’s international baroque scene.

by Total Baroque 4 December 2025

“Venetian Passions” by Les Cris de Paris

Video of the week

“Venetian Passions” by Les Cris de Paris

Under the direction of Geoffrey Jourdain, Les Cris de Paris explore seventeenth-century Venetian madrigals, weaving together the city’s characteristic polychoral writing with the emerging dramatic accents of early opera. A performance that reveals the full richness of a city in chiaroscuro, alive with its own ambiguities.

by Total Baroque 4 December 2025

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Presto – News feed

Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, German Record Critics’ Award 2026

The German Record Critics’ Association (Schallplattenkritik e.V.) has just announced the winners for 2026. Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin (AKAMUS) has been named honourary prize in the classical music category. The jury recalls that “it all began with a discovery in an attic in the GDR, where it was virtually impossible to obtain historical instruments. […]

by Total Baroque 3 December 2025

Presto – News feed

Hortus Harmonicus, a new Baroque festival in Livorno (Italy)

Hortus Harmonicus, a new baroque music festival, will take place in December in Livorno, Italy. Under the artistic direction of Federico Maria Sardelli and Roberto Sbolci, it will be held in the historic Teatro Goldoni and two magnificent baroque churches. The programme for this first edition includes rare pieces and famous Baroque masterpieces by Vivaldi, […]

by Total Baroque 2 December 2025

Presto – News feed

Conductor Michael Alexander Willens Telemann Prize 2026

The 2026 Telemann Prize has been awarded to conductor Michael Alexander Willens. With this distinction, Magdeburg, Telemann’s birthplace, wanted to pay tribute to the American conductor’s impressive interpretation of his work.A native of Maryland, Willens first performed in Magdeburg in 2012, conducting Telemann’s St Luke Passion (1728) with the Kölner Akademie orchestra. Since then, he […]

by Total Baroque 2 December 2025

Pictures of the Week

Brussels, London, New York, Lisbon, Versailles, Leipzig

From Brussels to London, from Lisbon to Versailles, from New York to Leipzig: concerts, tours and anniversaries shape our Images of the Week, where underground festivals, Baroque masterworks, triumphant performances and tributes to Bach intersect.

by Total Baroque 27 November 2025

Haendel’s “Il Trionfo…” with René Jacobs

Video of the week

Haendel’s “Il Trionfo…” with René Jacobs

Handel’s first oratorio, written at the age of 23, “Il Trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno” here benefits from the meticulous work of René Jacobs, his soloists and the Freiburger Barockorchester, attentive to the mobility and contrasts of the score. An interpretation that places the text at its centre in order to come as close as possible to the musical and expressive fabric of the composer.

by Total Baroque 27 November 2025

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Presto – News feed

Leipzig Bach Festival 2026 : a hit parade of 50 cantatas

Under the motto ‘Im Dialog’ (In Dialogue), the Leipzig Bach Festival – from 11 to 21 June 2026 – will feature a cycle of 50 cantatas in twelve parts, based on the principle of the good old radio hit parade. The festival will also present more than 200 events. For the first time in the […]

by Total Baroque 26 November 2025

Presto – News feed

Johann Sebastian Bach tops the Top 10 chart on Germany’s leading TV channel

The six cantatas from Johann Sebastian Bach’s Christmas Oratorio top the list of the Top 10 classical and choral music pieces, according to a survey conducted by the German television channel ARD among its online community. Bach’s Mass in B minor comes in at No. 2. Also noteworthy is Handel’s Messiah, which ranks No. 5.

by Total Baroque 26 November 2025

Presto – News feed

Le Poème Harmonique and Cappella Mediterranea (France) winners of the 2025 International Opera Awards

Le Poème Harmonique and the Dijon Opera, for Baldassare Galupi’s L’Uomo Femina, in the ‘Rediscovered Work’ category, and Cappella Mediterranéa for Lully’s Atys, (on the Chateau de Versailles label) in the ‘Complete Opera Recording’ category, are the winners of the 2025 International Opera Awards. The awards ceremony took place in Athens at the Greek National […]

by Total Baroque 26 November 2025

CD – New Releases

“Water Music” – Body & Soul Consort

With this new album, Ellen Giacone and her quintet Body & Soul Consort explore early music through the lens of water, bringing voices and instruments together in a consort where the body and breath play a central role.

by Total Baroque 21 November 2025